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Woody Allen’s Harlem Renaissance, Not In Black And White

First of all before we talk about the Wood mans art. What is he looking at in the photo above, Scarlett Johansson’s Jewelry (cough, cough) or those things on each side of the jewelry?Now back to the news, Gawker reports that:

Bullets Over Broadway, a new musical based on Woody Allen‘s movie of the same name, debuts on Broadway Thursday night. The play features Zach Braff, Helene Yorke, Vincent Pastore, and no black people. Because, according to the New York Daily News, Woody Allen doesn’t want them.

Actually, that’s not entirely true. There’s one actress of color, Kelcy Griffin, in the dance ensemble. But for a show that takes place partially in and around the Harlem Renaissance-era Cotton Club, the cast sure is white. And this doesn’t even seem like an honest mistake, like that unfortunate time Aladdin producers straight-up forgot to cast any Middle Eastern actors. No, this, allegedly, is an entirely deliberate omission.

“Everyone’s white at Woody’s Cotton Club and in the gangster numbers,” says our well-placed Broadway insider. “Casting was considering a big-name African-American actor for the play, but Woody passed because he just got the idea that a black gangster wouldn’t be good. One man wasn’t asked back and then was told it was Woody who didn’t want any black gangsters.”

Although a representative for Allen told the paper that the report is “completely untrue,” it’s hard to find another reason the cast is even less diverse than white-person favorite Phantom of the Opera, which recently cast Norm Lewis in the title role. In Woody Allen’s world, there were no black gangsters or club-goers in 1920s Harlem. In Woody Allen’s world, the truth is whatever he wants it to be.

We live in a great country that allows everyone to make the kind of movies they want to make and audiences to see the kind of movies they want to see.

Nothing is better then voting with your feet to go see or not see these kind of movies at theaters or with your hands when ordering these movies online or wherever you may access it (Source).

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